Back to Normal! (Tinker AFB, OK)

We moved to Tinker AFB near Oklahoma City, OK.  All of the following photos are from our last day at USACE Washington Cove on Copan Lake near Bartlesville, OK.  We would have stayed longer but the park closed on October 31.  

We took advantage of the perfect fall weather by spending a lot of time outdoors.  We walked around the park and sat outside with all four cats.  It was so sunny with light jacket temperatures that even the leaves seemed to be reluctant to acknowledge that fall was here.  

Very few of the trees were changing their colors.  I bet the area around the lake is gorgeous when the fall colors finally arrive.  The wild life was very busy around us.  Squirrels gathering acorns with a large variety of water birds stopping by the lake on their way south.  We even saw one Great Blue Heron fishing along the beach.  He did not like us stopping to watch him and would take off squawking the whole time.  Sigh!  SO nice!

Warm enough for fungi

Too bad we had to leave.  It was so peaceful.  Most of the sites were empty making it even more enjoyable for the cats to get out and do some exploring.

I decided to use my Fish-eye lens to get close-ups of the cats.  Plus, this lens captures more of the background while getting photos of the cats.  So, some of the photos are a little bent or distorted.

Dusty was loving the wide open spaces by running full speed towards one of us...

Dusty

 and making sure we saw him run by asking "did you see me run?"  He is definitely an outdoor cat.  We are positive he would have stayed behind at our last two sites if he had been given the choice.

That's right!

 Max was surprising us by exploring areas away from the door.  He usually doesn't go far from the motorhome's step.

He never strayed very far from one of us.  Every once in awhile he would follow Squirrel, but for the most part...

He was looking for attention from one of us in between eating grass or rolling in the dirt.

Squirrel on the other hand, wanted nothing to do with us.  There was too much to explore especially in the bushes in such a short time.  One of us had to follow him constantly to keep him from wandering off.  He doesn't like it when we tell him to go back.

And he really doesn't like the camera as you can see from these last two photos.  First I get the evil eye...

I'm ferocious!

now I'm getting the panting growling threat.  Squirrel doesn't know we are onto his "all bark and no bite" threats.  grrrr!

On The Cutting Board

I'm slowly getting a few mug rugs done.  All of the embroidery has been done on all five in the below photos and they are ready to be layered.

I want to finish the owls first before I pull out the sewing machine.  I want to make a day of sewing and ironing now that we have full hook-ups again.  We are here for the next 10 days so I should be able to find time to finish a few of them.

Now that we are back to a populated area, it is time to do some shopping!  We both need to stock up on a few of our favorite brands that we ran out of while staying in South Dakota and Kansas.  A shopping we will go!

Happy Quilting!

Season of Storms (Bartlesville, OK)

I'm happy to say that Dan and I decided to leave Amazon.  The pay was good, but the last two weeks have been some of the most intense and stressful times for us.  We were transferred from stocking/stowing bins to the packing area.  We were enjoying our job in the stowing area.  I thought packing would be fun too, but the job is too repetitive, not to mention, very noisy, and was causing both of us some problems.  We gave our new job a chance and decided it just wasn't for us.  We asked managers and HR if we could move back or to another area with no result.  Well, it is time to move on.

USACE Copan Lake 

We plan to spend a couple of weeks in Tinker AFB near Oklahoma City, OK and then on to see our granddaughters.

Season of Storms by Susanna Kearsley

After reading several of Susanna's previous books, I was excited to receive this one and started reading it immediately.  I was a little disappointed in her latest book and it took me a couple of months to finish because it just did not capture my attention.  The questionable paranormal or time travel activities that were so prominent in many of her books was lacking in this one.  A couple of times as the main character was walking through the gardens or getting lost in the mansion, I expected her to stumble into some kind of time slip or witness a scene from the past....but no.  So disappointing!

So the story is about Celia Sands who is named after a famous actress who disappeared in the 1920s from a beautiful Italian estate owned by her married lover and a famous playwright.  He has written a special 3-person play just for the first Celia, but it never makes it to the stage due to the first Celia's disappearance.  Alex the great grandson of the playwright decides to open the play on the very same estate and offers Celia's part to the new modern Celia Sands.

There is a lot of details about how the actors prepare for theater starting with the first reading right up to dress rehearsals.  Not my cup of tea, really.  And except for one Tarot card reading with foreboding warnings, one séance, creaking boards, and maybe hearing the dead Celia murmuring late at night, this was just a couple of mysteries from the past and present with flashbacks to the lovers in the 1920s that no one saw or experienced.   This was basically a murder mystery.

I preferred Shadowy Horses or Winter Sea over this one, but I see Susanna already has a new book coming out in April and it sounds like it will be more to my liking with more Jacobite history in A Desperate Fortune.  I have already pre-order for my Kindle.

In the meantime, I started reading Marianna  and I am already halfway through it!  My imagination was captured in the first chapter with the strange coincidences that happened to the main character over a twenty year time leading her to buy a house that she claimed as a child was her house.  Ohhh, and it gets so much better the more I read!  And that's all I'm going to say because I want to get back to my book...

On The Cutting Board
Before I go...
I did get a little ironing and sewing done since my last post.  I just love the way these two owls are coming out!

Happy Quilting!